Towering tomatoes

According to my notes this is still Thursday. And after the wet start, things took off and the team of workers (JB and Bernard) arrived to do their bit about the property as well. They are building a set of steps from the pool shed (old stables) up to the swimming pool. Progress going well, but with so much rain last night, they don’t dare work the soil today. Instead Bernard made shelves for the pantry and JB removed stones.

Now things look a bit alarming right now, but this is the side of the shade garden. Yes, it looks like a landslide. But once the stones are gone and the soil is moved back up where it belongs I can get on with planting it up with grasses. We had originally planned for this to be another stone wall. That’s the reason why all the stones are stockpiled here. But as the progress of the walls is excruciatingly slow and expensive, a planted bank of grasses it shall be. Cheaper at half the price. And once the stones go I will even be able to sow grass seeds on the long path that leads from the barn to the far steps behind the pool. It’s days like this that you can imagine progress and picture the finished product.
What else did I do? I sowed a small packet of grasses collected from Pearl Beach north of Sydney and then shuffled the plants about in the shed. And when in doubt I am potting on the cosmos. There’s acres of the stuff. but they will look pretty in the potager among the vegetables.

I had one more clematis that was growing well under glass, but decided to plant it out under the cherry tree next to the potting shed. That’s where I can keep an eye on it. It’s another one of my mystery plants: but probably won’t flower this year so I should be safe.

Then by lunchtime the sun came out and I sprinted full pelt to the vegetable garden to get the crops in. First up came the tomatoes tethered to their mighty poles. I think there is room for two more here in this part of the garden: more exotic varieties perhaps. Here is the list of what has gone in:

Tomate Poire jaune

Tomate Ananas

Tomate Noire de Crimee

Tomate Coeur de Boeuf

Tomate Marmande

Tomate Corazon (an F1)

Tomate Tigrelle Bicolore

Tomate Cornue des Andes

Next I put in the green poles for the future climbing French beans. Very handsome they are too, and I must look out for more when I see them. I noticed that the garden centre I usually go to has put up all its prices: potting mix that was seven euros last year is now ten, poles that were two fifty are now almost four. It does make for a bit of a shock at the check out – but I keep telling myself I am investing in infrastructure (with the poles) so they won’t wear out. But potting mix is a very temporary affair. And with all my plants I am going through it at a rate of knots.

There is enough room for more peas so I sowed two rows of peas next to a future pea netted pole. I ran out of pea nets. Well, I have plenty of the thinner netting, but I have to use it to drape over all the sowed seedlings to stop them being eaten by deer.

Not a problem for the salad; they have their own dedicated cloche. I planted out 45 salad plugs and kept some of the non-bolting land cress in place wherever they looked sturdy. Ruined my pretty design and planting scheme having random land cress among the lettuce, but I’ll live. I’m much more utilitarian this year.

Under another protective cloche I planted out the precious six aubergine plants. I really should drape some fleece over these fragile looking hothouse plants: massive leaves and very top heavy. But I am hoping that the stakes and the cloche will hold off the worst of any shredding storm.

As I was pacing about the garden for the last time this fortnight I decided to have a quick weed of the carrot rows. They are just germinating which is a thrill. As are the marigolds up in the potting shed. I sowed marigolds in a drill between the carrot rows last year and neglected to thin them out. I had a dense crop. So this year I will pace and space a bit better. And hopefully the deer won’t notice the unnetted carrot fronds sticking out the soil.

The potatoes are up a bit – I don’t dare walk on the rows to weed between the potatoes just yet. At the end of the month things will be sturdier. And I am hoping that I can put the lawn clippings between the rows to keep the worst of the weeds down. It’s the only part of the vegetable garden that isn’t covered in weedproof fabric. I am hoping that the density of the potato plants will cover the bare soil rather quickly.

Then I decided – perhaps rashly- to plant out the corn even though they are rather small and have only had three days of hardening off. I have about twenty more seeds as a back up still germinating, so if I lose these ones planted it won’t be the end of the world.

I planted the corn in two rows down the left hand side of the potager; hopefully turning it into a green hedge and shielding the mess of the potager from the neat rows of the lawn and pool. And if the verbena bonariensis comes up after its tough winter under the snow then they may make a pretty double hedge. With a thin strip of grass path in between. We shall see. The grass path is more scalped weed than lawn, but it’s early yet.

The strawberries are looking lush: last year we lost the entire crop, so here’s hoping things get pollinated and fruiting soon.

My happy work in the potager was only slowed down when a tremendous clap of thunder at 5pm meant all the workers had to bid a hasty retreat. JB (a former resident of Le Buisson) is moving stones and helping Bernard with the step building, so we were an industrious trio all afternoon.

I went into the shed to hide from the rain and potted on the climbing French beans into the newly available root trainers. From corn to beans in about half an hour. That’s what I call a quick turnaround.